Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit
Are regular printers that bad, if buy brother?

I bought a B/W laser printer and have been generally impressed with the lack of BS that came a long with it.

It did ask for toner once, so I bought something from a third-party.

Some are good, some are bad, buyer beware.

No direct experience, but I recently read[1] Brother HL-L3220CW counts printed pages, and refuses to print after a set number of pages, even if there's still toner in the cartridge. Some models have a way to reset the page count but this one apparently does not.

[1] https://spicausis-lv.translate.goog/2025/01-brother/?_x_tr_s...

(I also use a Brother B/W laser printer, got it second hand for almost nothing, works fine)

Does the printer also refuse to print when using toners not part of the EcoPro subscription, though? Or is this just another case of people expecting their subscription toners/cartridges to last beyond their payment? I can't blame them, the marketing is sneaky about it, I just see it often on threads about HP.

The post did mention the other toners that came with the printer also locked, but I think I remember reading elsewhere that those printers are cheaper precisely because they come with EcoPro-only toners in the box.

loading story #42767019
loading story #42765706
loading story #42765682